Quarterly cash dividend raised 22 percent to $0.14 per share. Company to return $1.25 billion to shareholders in fiscal 2018.

NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) today reported revenue for the third quarter ended October 30, 2016, of $2.00 billion, up 54 percent from $1.30 billion a year earlier, and up 40 percent from $1.43 billion in the previous quarter.

GAAP earnings per diluted share for the quarter were $0.83, up 89 percent from $0.44 a year ago and up 102 percent from $0.41 in the previous quarter. Non-GAAP earnings per diluted share were $0.94, up 104 percent from $0.46 a year earlier and up 77 percent from $0.53 in the previous quarter.

"We had a breakout quarter - record revenue, record margins and record earnings were driven by strength across all product lines," said Jen-Hsun Huang, founder and chief executive officer, NVIDIA. "Our new Pascal GPUs are fully ramped and enjoying great success in gaming, VR, self-driving cars and datacenter AI computing.

"We have invested years of work and billions of dollars to advance deep learning. Our GPU deep learning platform runs every AI framework, and is available in cloud services from Amazon, IBM, Microsoft and Alibaba, and in servers from every OEM. GPU deep learning has sparked a wave of innovations that will usher in the next era of computing," he said.

Capital Return
During the first nine months of fiscal 2017, NVIDIA paid $509 million in share repurchases and $185 million in cash dividends. As a result, the company has returned an aggregate of $694 million to shareholders in the first nine months of the fiscal year. The company intends to return $1.0 billion to shareholders in fiscal 2017.

For fiscal 2018, NVIDIA intends to return $1.25 billion to shareholders through ongoing quarterly cash dividends and share repurchases. The company's board of directors has authorized an additional $2.00 billion under the company's stock repurchase program for a total of $2.96 billion available through the end of December 2020.

The company announced a 22 percent increase in its quarterly cash dividend to $0.14 per share from $0.115 per share, to be paid with its next quarterly cash dividend on December 19, 2016, to all shareholders of record on November 28, 2016.

Q3 FY2017 Summary

GAAP

($ in millions except earnings per share)

Q3 FY17

Q2 FY17

Q3 FY16

Q/Q

Y/Y

Revenue

$

2,004

$

1,428

$

1,305

Up 40%

Up 54%

Gross margin

59.0%

57.9%

56.3%

Up 110 bps

Up 270 bps

Operating expenses

$

544

$

509

$

489

Up 7%

Up 11%

Operating income

$

639

$

317

$

245

Up 102%

Up 161%

Net income*

$

542

$

261

$

246

Up 108%

Up 120%

Diluted earnings per share*

$

0.83

$

0.41

$

0.44

Up 102%

Up 89%

Non-GAAP

($ in millions except earnings per share)

Q3 FY17

Q2 FY17

Q3 FY16

Q/Q

Y/Y

Revenue

$

2,004

$

1,428

$

1,305

Up 40%

Up 54%

Gross margin

59.2%

58.1%

56.5%

Up 110 bps

Up 270 bps

Operating expenses

$

478

$

448

$

430

Up 7%

Up 11%

Operating income

$

708

$

382

$

308

Up 85%

Up 130%

Net income

$

570

$

313

$

255

Up 82%

Up 124%

Diluted earnings per share

$

0.94

$

0.53

$

0.46

Up 77%

Up 104%

* In the third quarter of fiscal 2017, NVIDIA adopted a new accounting standard (ASU 2016-09), which requires adjustments to be reflected beginning in fiscal 2017, including all fiscal quarters within the year. The primary impact of adoption was the recognition of excess tax benefits in the provision for income taxes rather than paid-in capital on the balance sheet. Adoption of the new standard resulted in a GAAP diluted earnings per share benefit of $0.02 and $0.01 for the first and second quarters of fiscal 2017, respectively.

CFO Commentary
Commentary on the quarter by Colette Kress, NVIDIA's executive vice president and chief financial officer, is available at http://investor.nvidia.com/.

Conference Call and Webcast Information
NVIDIA will conduct a conference call with analysts and investors to discuss its third quarter fiscal 2017 financial results and current financial prospects today at 2 p.m. Pacific time (5 p.m. Eastern time). To listen to the conference call, dial (877) 223-3864 in the United States or (574) 990-1377 internationally, and provide the following conference ID: 945 459 89. A live webcast (listen-only mode) of the conference call will be accessible at NVIDIA's investor relations website, http://investor.nvidia.com, and at www.streetevents.com. The webcast will be recorded and available for replay until the company's conference call to discuss its financial results for its fourth quarter and fiscal year 2017.

Non-GAAP Measures
To supplement NVIDIA's Condensed Consolidated Statements of Income and Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheets presented in accordance with GAAP, the company uses non-GAAP measures of certain components of financial performance. These non-GAAP measures include non-GAAP gross profit, non-GAAP gross margin, non-GAAP operating expenses, non-GAAP income from operations, non-GAAP other income (expense), net, non-GAAP income tax expense, non-GAAP net income, non-GAAP net income, or earnings, per diluted share, non-GAAP diluted shares, and free cash flow. In order for NVIDIA's investors to be better able to compare its current results with those of previous periods, the company has shown a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures. These reconciliations adjust the related GAAP financial measures to exclude stock-based compensation expense, legal settlement costs, product warranty charge, acquisition-related costs, contributions, restructuring and other charges, gains from non-affiliated investments, interest expense related to amortization of debt discount, loss on early debt conversions, and the associated tax impact of these items, where applicable. Weighted average shares used in the non-GAAP diluted net income per share computation includes the anti-dilution impact of the company's Note Hedge. Free cash flow is calculated as GAAP net cash provided by operating activities less purchases of property and equipment and intangible assets. NVIDIA believes the presentation of its non-GAAP financial measures enhances the user's overall understanding of the company's historical financial performance. The presentation of the company's non-GAAP financial measures is not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the company's financial results prepared in accordance with GAAP, and its non-GAAP measures may be different from non-GAAP measures used by other companies.

Weighted average shares used in diluted net income per share computation

GAAP*

653

634

565

636

563

Anti-dilution impact from note hedge (E)

(45

)

(43

)

(10

)

(42

)

(6

)

Non-GAAP

608

591

555

594

557

GAAP net cash provided by operating activities*

$

432

$

201

$

255

$

951

$

664

Purchase of property and equipment and intangible assets

(38

)

(33

)

(16

)

(125

)

(71

)

Free cash flow

$

394

$

168

$

239

$

826

$

593

* In third quarter of fiscal 2017, NVIDIA adopted an accounting standard (ASU 2016-09), which requires adjustments to be reflected beginning in fiscal 2017, including all fiscal quarters within the year.

(E) Represents the number of shares that would be delivered upon conversion of the currently outstanding 1.00% Convertible Senior Notes Due 2018. Under GAAP, shares delivered in hedge transactions are not considered offsetting shares in the fully diluted share calculation until actually delivered.

About NVIDIANVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) is the AI computing company. Its invention of the GPU in 1999 sparked the growth of the PC gaming market, redefined modern computer graphics and revolutionized parallel computing. More recently, GPU deep learning ignited modern AI — the next era of computing — with the GPU acting as the brain of computers, robots and self-driving cars that can perceive and understand the world. More information at http://nvidianews.nvidia.com/.

Certain statements in this press release including, but not limited to statements as to: strength across all product lines; Pascal GPUs enjoying great success; the availability of the company's GPU deep learning platform; the impact of GPU deep learning; the company's intended capital return for fiscal 2017 and fiscal 2018; the company's next quarterly cash dividend; the company's financial outlook for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2017; the company's tax rates for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2017; and the impact and benefits of NVIDIA gaming technology, GeForce GTX GPUs, Tesla P40 and P4 GPUs, TensorRT, the collaboration with FANUC, DRIVE PX 2, the partnership with Baidu and the AI partnership with TomTom are forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include: global economic conditions; our reliance on third parties to manufacture, assemble, package and test our products; the impact of technological development and competition; development of new products and technologies or enhancements to our existing product and technologies; market acceptance of our products or our partners' products; design, manufacturing or software defects; changes in consumer preferences or demands; changes in industry standards and interfaces; unexpected loss of performance of our products or technologies when integrated into systems; as well as other factors detailed from time to time in the reports NVIDIA files with the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, including its Form 10-Q for the fiscal period ended July 31, 2016. Copies of reports filed with the SEC are posted on the company's website and are available from NVIDIA without charge. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and speak only as of the date hereof, and, except as required by law, NVIDIA disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances.